A popular game in the United States, Japan, Cuba and other countries of the world is baseball. Most of the action in a baseball game takes place between a pitcher and a batter. The rules require that the pitcher pitch the baseball within an imaginary strike zone over a plate, termed a "home plate." Any pitch that does not pass through the strike zone is called a "ball" and if four balls are pitched the batter is permitted to first base, thereby putting the batter in play without the requirement of striking the ball. The strike zone is an imaginary rectangular area having a width equal to the width of the home plate, a lower edge that is an imaginary line drawn at the knees of the batter, and an upper edge which is an imaginary line drawn at the shoulders of the batter. Thus, when considering the distance from the pitchers mound to the batters box the strike zone is a relatively small rectangular area through which a ball must pass for a pitch to be effective. A pitcher capable of consistently throwing a ball at a high speed through a strike zone is in great demand by schools and by professional baseball teams. For this reason, a large number of young athletes spend considerable time perfecting baseball pitching skills since the salaries paid for professional baseball pitchers exceed that of most other professions.
In order to help athletes prefect their baseball pitching skills various devices and machines have been invented for their aid and for background reference to machines and other apparatuses used for improving baseball pitching performances, reference may be had to the following U.S. Pat. Nos.: 3,469,840; 4,877,243; 4,871,169; 4,858,921; 4,846,471; 4,819,937; 4,783,070; 4,655,452; 3,602,504; 3,497,218; 4,915,384 and 4,708,343.